Understanding the rise of China
In his global best-seller When China Rules the World: The Rise of the Middle Kingdom and the End of the Western World, Dr Martin Jacques, a senior Fellow at Cambridge University, argues “We can’t understand the rise of China using Western concepts”.
According to him, China is on track to become the world’s largest economy. (By 2050, India will also rival the US.) This is a unique situation as we have not had for 200 years a developing country as the world’s dominant country. Moreover, Westerners assume that modernization means westernization - but China is not like the West and will not become like the West. This possibly explains why the West fails to deliver a fair view of China’s rise. In many of the Westerners eyes China’s economic growth and its corresponding cooperation with and funding for other nations are just “neon-colonialism”, “Chinese threat” or “Debt trap”.
While the West fragmented at the end of the Roman Empire, and remains fragmented today, China has remained a single civilization with its values of ancestor worship, family, state, Guanxi, Confucian culture and so on.
Chinese are fundamentally shaped by their civilization. China has been the greatest power for nearly 3000 years. Gavin Menzies, the author of best seller “1421” gives an enthralling account with persuasive evidence that China has already made herself a leading power in many aspects including circumnavigation and astronomy by 1421 as Huawei is in 5G today. In his another masterpiece “1434” Gavin Menzies states that China’s influence has sparked the Renaissance. The course of Western civilization was changed forever.
Admittedly, China’s long, continuous history as a country and culture has a profound influence on the character of Chinese, paving the way for today’s rapid development. In a similar vein, well-known academic Dr Greg Mills claims that China’s cultural dimension, combining an ancient civilization with Confucian values, has distinguished China’s economic growth path from the others’.
I opine that culture opens new avenues for development. Culture is at the vanguard of social and economic development in China. China’s cultural identity has held China together. Chinese cultural values of collectivism, polychromous approach to time, world views, culture of high power distance, etc are important engines to drive China’s economic and social development even when the Western world was suffering from its financial crisis as was in 2008.
The political value in China is unity and solidarity. To the Chinese government, unity and political stability environment are always first items on their agenda. Chinese as a culture values more than any other nations unity, stability, solidarity and integrity. Building stable political institutions and environment make it possible for China to concentrate on its social-economic and political developments.
The Chinese state is the embodiment of Chinese civilization. In Western democracies, the state and power are constructed differently -- the Western state’s power is limited and challenged. In China, the state has legitimacy and authority as a member of the family. In Chinese psyche, a family will stop its existence if without state (big family). The state has always played a major role in building infrastructure -- Great Wall in Qin Dynasty, Grand Canal built in 14 century and today the Three Gorges Dam, among others.
No countries have more effectively
and successfully unleashed the power of culture in their economic and social development as China has demonstrated. No governments have more power to call for efficient collective mobilizations to face their challenges and save their people out of poverty as China has done as attested from China’s rapid and effective control of Covid-19 pandemic. No people can sacrifice and give up their individuals interests for the sake of the national interests as Chinese do. China’s culture-endowed social cohesion is the fundamental guarantee of development. The media, inclusive of social media in China advocates social unity, solidarity, harmony and inclusion, thus creating a culture of civilization, contribution, and positive energy.
Martin Jacques further points out, the West thinks of itself as cosmopolitan. But in reality, the West is parochial. Developing countries have been forced to learn about the West and know the West -- whereas the West, especially Europe, is ignorant of the rest of the world.
Drawing a conclusion, Martin Jacques claims, the rise of developing countries, following 200 years of world leadership by a small fraction of the West, represents a major democratization of world power, for which we should all be happy. The West should address and accommodate different cultures and understand the rise of China psychologically, politically and ideologically.